


your ship may be coming in, you're weak but not giving in

by EyeScreamQueen



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Anxiety, Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Depression, Dissociation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Kinda, Medication, Mental Health Issues, Other, Pearl-centric (Steven Universe), SSRIs, Sad Lapis Lazuli (Steven Universe), Sad Pearl (Steven Universe), Side Effects, Suicidal Thoughts, background pearlmethyst, everyone has depression basically, internalised mental health stigma, platonic Pearl/ Lapis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:07:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25993393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EyeScreamQueen/pseuds/EyeScreamQueen
Summary: Lapis pays Pearl a visit for a late-night Camp Pining Hearts marathon.Quick missing moment from Chapter 10 of 'you said you and I would read fairytales again one night'. Can be read as a standalone.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 19





	your ship may be coming in, you're weak but not giving in

**Author's Note:**

> Context for those who haven't read 'you said you and I would read fairytales again one night': this takes place following Pearl's breakdown after Rose's death, on top of years of unresolved issues.
> 
> The title is taken from 'A Better Son/ Daughter' by Rilo Kiley, which is the song I most closely associate with Pearl's breakdown and recovery as written in 'you said...'. 
> 
> Massive content warnings for: depression, anxiety, suicide ideation, references to self-injury. Anyone affected by the issues listed should swerve this fic. Pearl's attitude to her own illness is Not To Be Emulated.

It's the middle of the night, and Pearl is - once again - lying awake.

The blinking digits of the alarm clock tell her it's past one. Her eyes ache, her head is throbbing, and Pearl just... doesn't care. One in the morning is barely distinguishable from one in the afternoon, nowadays.

Her day had passed without incident: more of the same oppressive blank feeling, not quite tiredness, but a million miles from anything she could consider functional. Amethyst had gotten home around ten and tried to cajole her into eating some leftover rice and veggies, as per the meal plan pinned to the fridge. Pearl had managed to force down a few mouthfuls, not out of hunger, but to stop Amethyst looking so worried about her - it was perfectly nutritionally balanced and lovingly prepared, yet it had felt like chewing gravel. Her stomach is still churning as she lies in bed next to the gently snoring form of her girlfriend; though she thinks, numbly, that that could well be from the meds.

She feels so _useless_. Millions of people experience difficulties far more pronounced than her own - there are people the world over enduring unimaginable pain and trauma, for goodness' sake; and here she is, this pathetic carcass, too weak even to reliably produce her own neurotransmitters. They can diagnose her with whatever they like, but she knows that the common denominator is her; that nothing and nobody can change the pointlessness of her own existence. All her suggestions as to how to resolve that particular issue were met, at best, with horror. 

"Pearl," Amethyst had begged, through tears, "don't _ever_ say that. I can't lose you. I love you so much. You're sick and we're gonna get through this but please, please, promise me you ain't gonna do anything crazy."

It doesn't feel crazy. It feels like the only logical step. But everyone had shouted her down, varying shades of horror and distress, and she's all out of fight. 

She had fought, at first, when she'd still had the energy for it. She hadn't been able to wrestle free of Garnet's grip, that one awful time she'd slammed through the locked bathroom door and found Pearl... testing her logic. She'd screamed and she'd struggled but the strong hands had held her steady, and after that the apartment had been carefully combed for anything Pearl could theoretically use to do herself damage. (And she hadn't spoken to Garnet for almost two weeks after, far past caring whether or not Garnet was mad at her.)

She is glad - or as close to glad as she's capable of getting - that Rose isn't here to see this. Rose's typical effusive praise, which Pearl could never have deserved even before her brain gave up, would have truly tipped her over the edge. 

She sighs, sits up against her pillows, staring out into the inky gloom of her bedroom. Her medication has been increased since her last visit to her physician, with Amethyst coaxing her into taking it every evening; either personally, or down the phone from work under the guise of a smoke break. Despite the late hour, she feels _wired_. Not pleasantly so, either: she feels jittery; the hot sick feeling of bile burning her throat and making her eyes water; and she knows, if she were to glance in the mirror, that her pupils would be gigantic.

All side effects, she's been told. Her body is adjusting to the medication and to the sudden increase in serotonin coursing through her body. She's been told that they'll pass once she settles onto the new dosage, but for now, she feels a grim irony in feeling _physically_ worse due to a medication prescribed to help her feel _mentally_ better. It's swings and fucking roundabouts, she reflects; a ripple of bitterness permeating the empty sprawling absence of feeling - and every last one has her dizzy and nauseous.

Her phone beeps, bluish light of the screen illuminating the darkness from the nightstand. She considers ignoring it, but - it's one twenty-two in the morning. What excuse can she come up with? She hasn't had a regular sleep pattern in months and everyone knows it, plus she knows what they all get like if she doesn't reply to their messages. 

A glance at the screen tells her it's Lapis, and she picks up her phone, resigning herself to reading whatever she has to say that can't wait 'til morning.

_hey. Ame said you were feeling shitty._

Pearl rolls her eyes in the dark. She wishes sourly that everyone could stop talking about her behind her back; even as she responds, loading the clipped reply with as much sarcasm as she can muster.

_That would be accurate._

_nights are the worst huh_

_Oh._ Well. Pearl reflects that this is, after all, Lapis she's talking to. She can at least trust her not to repeat the same inane buzzwords and infuriating optimistic nonsense that everyone else seems to be spouting.

_Yes._

_wanna watch tv_

_No._

_yeah... i don't mean 'want' as in actually WANT to do it. i get that's not a thing right now._

_was more of a warning_

_since i'm outside your apartment_

_so let me in, it's fucking freezing_

Pearl is so startled she almost drops her phone. Surely Lapis can't be serious. It's the dead of night. As she's replying, halfway out of bed, a picture message pops onto the screen: their mailbox, blurry and poorly lit, but unmistakable. 

_do you seriously want me to buzz and wake Ame up_

Pearl scrambles out of bed, throwing on the old t-shirt of Amethyst's she'd worn the previous day, as she makes for the door. 

* * *

"What are you doing here?" she hisses as she lets Lapis in. 

"Hello yourself," mutters Lapis. It's been raining out, and stray droplets of water cling to Lapis' bangs and roll off her jacket as she tosses it unceremoniously onto the floor. 

"I - for God's sake, keep your voice _down_ ," Pearl snaps, under her breath, as she turns on the lamp. 

"No need to bother whispering. Ame sleeps like she's knocked out," Lapis shrugs, unmoved. "And I'm doing exactly what I said. We're going to watch TV."

"Lapis," Pearl says, anger and confusion breaking through the thick fog of ennui, "it is late. I am exhausted. I want you to go home right now, and - "

"Oh, sure," Lapis replies, flatly, producing a DVD box set from her purse and moving to the television set. "So you're gonna be up 'til daybreak feeling sick as fuck, alone and miserable; while I do another loop of the zip code in the rain? No dice. Don't be an ass, Pearl."

Pearl gapes at her, caught off guard by the sheer nerve of her basically barging in and then insulting her at an unsociable time of night, but gives up. She has no energy for an argument - or anything else for that matter. 

"Fine," she mumbles, sitting down on the couch. Lapis gives her an expressionless thumbs-up.

"Try whatever channel DVDs play on."

Mutely, Pearl jabs a button on the remote control. The looping letters of the Camp Pining Hearts title screen crackle into view, and she presses the volume control a few times so that the music doesn't disturb Amethyst in the next room. Lapis gets up and switches the lamp off, leaving the DVD case open on the floor, as she seats herself on the opposite end of the couch to Pearl.

"You've seen this before, right?" 

Pearl gives a tiny shake of the head. Lapis hits play - and it occurs to Pearl, as she looks at her friend in the faint light cast by the TV, that Lapis looks every bit as wrung out as Pearl feels. There are dark circles under her eyes, her hair is unkempt in a way that would be difficult to achieve just from a half-hour's walk, and her movements are slow and lethargic, as if every single one takes an immense effort to execute.

"Are you... okay?" she ventures, haltingly. Lapis raises an eyebrow without taking her eyes off the screen.

"What a question; coming from the person who's not eating, not sleeping, and has to be bullied into taking her head meds."

Pearl shrinks back at Lapis' words - quietly uttered, but with a heaping spoonful of scorn. Lapis' vacant gaze slides slowly left to meet hers. 

"Look. You feel like shit. I get it. I... _really_ get it." Lapis doesn't look at her, but casts her eyes about until she spots the couch throw; bundling it into her hand and tossing it at Pearl. "And it's awful. But... just, go along with it - the appointments, the pills, whatever. I know everything feels like pointless bull right now, but you have to do what they say." She picks listlessly at a stray thread from her racerback. "They care. Let them."

Pearl hugs her legs to her chest, smoothing the blanket over them. "I..." Her voice cracks. She's quickly realising she can't get away with lying to Lapis on this topic. "I'm trying. It's..." Her eyes sting with tears as her throat burns with acid. "It's hard."

"Yeah," Lapis replies, in a monotone, eyes fixed upon a stain on the carpet. "Yeah, it is. And I'm not going to do all the 'it gets better' crap because right now, it's not going to help. But... don't quit on them. They haven't quit on you. You'll thank them for it, eventually."

"What about you?" Pearl asks. Lapis scoffs. 

"You can thank me right now by shutting the fuck up, taking my advice, and letting me watch the show."

Pearl sniffles, burying her face in her knees. Lapis makes no attempt to comfort her, not moving an inch from her bored attitude on the couch as she returns her line of sight to Camp Pining Hearts, but she sighs. 

"Try taking your pills first thing in the morning. You'll feel sick as hell, for sure, but they won't keep you up as much."

"I'm sorry," whispers Pearl, scrubbing her face - a pointless action, as fresh tears spill past her lashes in the next instant. Lapis doesn't react, eyes trained on the show.

"Whatever. Just... cry quietly," she says, impassive. "Bunk Six are about to kick off the prank war."

* * *

Years later, midnight finds Lapis face-down on her unmade bed. Her blinds are drawn, her door is shut, and the room is silent save for the occasional muffled sniff.

Peridot has finally stopped knocking. Lapis had yelled at her to fuck off and leave her be - sick to the back teeth of Peridot's panicky heartbroken face, her tireless attempts to fix what can't be mended - and it seems her girlfriend has listened, at last. Chances she's retreated to Amethyst's place or her own room, to freak out where Lapis can't hear her.

She supposes she should feel bad, but honestly, Lapis doesn't care. She doesn't care about anything right now.

Her phone buzzes. She drags her head up, fumbling for the device with hands that don't feel like her own; reads the message through dull, red-rimmed eyes.

_Lapis - Peridot texted. I've got the car. Queue up CPH and I'll be with you in 15 minutes._

God, Pearl is _annoying_. But, as she leaves the message unanswered and curls up on her side, Lapis figures she's probably earned the right to be.

**Author's Note:**

> If you read this and related to Pearl - or Lapis, for that matter - then please, please reach out for support. If support isn't forthcoming, keep reaching: online, to friends, family, professionals. You deserve to be heard, to feel supported and to have a chance at feeling better. Don't give up.


End file.
